DOA
by Punctuator
Summary: Admittedly a most tardy followup to "Bagels." There's got to be a morning after, and this one presents Lisa Reisert with a deadly race against time. Rated for violence, mild adult situations, and, of course, squee. Time to wake up!
1. Chapter 1

**D.O.A.**

Lisa woke up alone.

Actually, "alone" came third. Her first realization was that she was naked under the covers. Her first thought was _I don't sleep in the nude._ Reasoning, then, the _reason_ she was naked, struck her, a second realization, this one in three parts: remembrance of last night, shock at that remembrance, and-- most surprisingly of all-- the pleasure she felt at that remembrance. Which led, finally, to realization number three: she was alone.

Rippner wasn't with her.

She stretched like a cat, lazily and totally, and then lay on her back in the soft jumble of sheets and blankets and looked up at the off-white ceiling while her body told her tingling tales, wonderful tales, slightly sore tales, too, of last night.

Or yesterday afternoon. _What time is it--?_

She propped herself on her elbows and looked about for an alarm clock. A Sony on what had been Rippner's side of the bed told her in digital black: 10:18. She'd had a good sleep. Almost too good, given where and with whom she'd spent the night. And he was long gone, by the coolness of his pillow, his share of the covers. She sat for a moment, still and listening: no sound of running water from the bathroom, no radio or television from elsewhere. Nothing but quiet. She was accustomed to living alone; she felt she would know if Rippner were in the apartment.

Finding the note helped. A good-quality gray terrycloth robe was laid over the end of the bed. The paper was anchored beneath the robe's belt. Precise cursive lettering in sharp black ballpoint:

_Got a call. Business. Help yourself to anything._ _If you leave_-- Here followed locking instructions for the door, a key code. The location of his spare car and keys, in case she decided against a cab. How he was to re-acquire his car he left open.--

_Had a wonderful time last night. Really. Hope you did too._

_Dinner later?_

_J_

Ah. So that was how.

Her suitcase, purse, and carryon were on the floor near the foot of the bed. Her clothes from yesterday were draped neatly over a chair near the room's clean-lined wooden dresser. An odd feeling, strangely quaint, to think of Rippner tidying up for her. Lisa slipped into the robe, belted it at the waist, and picked a fresh outfit from her suitcase. Clean but slightly wrinkled. She regretted not unpacking yesterday. Then again, how could she have known how long she'd stay--? She took a quick shower, fixed her hair, applied her makeup much as she would on any working day. She'd taken the red eye night before last out of ingrained practicality, to save the company some money in sending her here, out of town, to a mini-convention of hotel managers; her first seminar wasn't until two. She felt the heavy, velvety relaxation lingering in her muscles and bones, and she thought--

_Lucky I didn't oversleep._ She smiled at herself, saw herself looking back, radiant and a little wolfish. She blushed.

"Harlot." Her smile became a grin. "Tramp."

Memories. A warm wash of them. Rippner touching her. Touching him in return. Kissing him, being kissed, his taste coursing through her like electricity--

"C'mon, Reisert. Time to focus."

When she walked back out into the bedroom, though--

_Help yourself to anything.  
_  
Lisa paused. She hesitated. Then she looked at his dresser, his closet. She opened the closet doors and looked in. A short row of dark tailored suits. Dress shirts. Mostly pale green, pale blue. Like his eyes. To the left, leisurewear. Polos, sweatshirts. Sweaters in neutral or woodsy colors. Jeans. She fingered the waistband on one faded pair. T-shirts farther to the side. Not undershirts. A series of commemoratives from various marathons. She lifted the bottom edge of one, pressed her nose to the soft fabric, took a sniff, caught the lightest hint of lavender.

It was then that she realized: _He's letting me stalk him.  
_  
Certainly he'd decided what he did-- and didn't-- want her to see. Still, at least this corner of his world was open to her. Case in point:

An upright chest, like a short mahogany wardrobe, at the back of the closet. Two outward-swinging doors, unlocked. Lisa opened the doors and looked.

A chill ran through her.

Knives. Blades gleamed in the closet's dim light. A double row of bladed mayhem on each door, strapped neatly against crushed blue velvet. Fixed blades, lockbacks. Among others, three matte-black Ka-Bars much shorter and more refined than the one Rippner had wielded at her father's house. A pistol-draw Ka-Bar belt-knife, a close-knuckle slasher. Two single-piece black CRKTs. A S.O.G. commando knife, a spring-action S.O.G. lockback. Three exotic Spydercos with handles beautifully inlaid with semi-precious stone, green shot through with black; streaked purple; striated, luminous gold. One of the handles bore an inscription: _With love.--Milla._

Lisa found herself staring. There were two empty spaces on the blue-black velvet. She shivered--

_A man who keeps knives in his bedroom._

She shut the cabinet and the closet, took her luggage and purse, went downstairs. In an alcove-study off the living area, Rippner's computer was on. He'd left that for her, too. She wondered just how far he'd seen into _her_ apartment. Was he showing her what he'd _taken_ from her...? His idea of trust: an exchange of violations?

Or was he simply being honest?

He might have hurt her last night. Or this morning. She'd slept while he woke, took his call, got dressed, left. Those knives ten feet from the bed. Had he watched her sleep--?

She found the idea eerie. She found herself amazed, too: she'd never imagined she could sleep so soundly with another human being moving about so near her.

To the right of the computer's flat-panel monitor, a phone set trilled. She reached for it automatically. With her hand inches from the receiver, she caught herself. At best, answering Rippner's phone would be bad manners. At worst, it might confirm her as a target for one of his enemies, a most deadly case of curiosity. She let it ring while she checked her purse for her copy of the convention schedule.

On the sixth ring, the answering machine kicked in:

_Hi. This is Jackson. I can't pick up right now, but I'd love to talk to you. Please leave a message. Wait for the tone, okay?  
_  
Right as she was thinking how unlike him the greeting sounded, or how unlike her impression of him-- the message on the machine seemed positively genial, that of a man with many friends, not many knives-- a voice began to chant from the speaker:

_Pick up, Lisa. Pick up pick up pick up--_

It wasn't Rippner. A man's voice, tenor, lilting. Possibly British ex-pat. Things you learned from talking to travelers day in, day out. She froze, staring at the phone--

_If you're there, pick up._

A sudden, cold spike of paranoia--

_I have Rippner._

Lisa snatched up the receiver. "Who is this?"

_Hello, Lisa. It_ is _Lisa, isn't it--? My name is Matthew Leon. Matt. I'm an associate of Rippner's. Make that, ah-- how best to say it-- a soon-to-be_ former _associate of Rippner's.  
_  
Lisa could hear a man coughing in the background. Retching. Her stomach tightened. "Let me speak to Jackson."

_Well, that will be difficult, _Leon said. His voice was coldly pleasant. _He's busy dying, you see. May I take a message?_


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:** Thanks so much for the kind comments! It's good to be back visiting with Mr. Rippner and Miss Reisert, even if they're not mine (something I never remember to say: the characters portrayed herein are the copyrighted property of others, I'm making no money from this, etc.). And even if, I suspect, I'm having a much better time than they are. At least for now. Heh.

*****

A muscle began to twitch in Lisa's jaw. "Why is Jackson dying, Mr. Leon?"

_Ah. Ah. I like that. Inquisitive but not accusing. You might well have demanded "What have you done to him?" Part of your management training--?  
_  
"Polite relationships are productive relationships, Matthew."

_I love this. First names now, is it--?_

"You can call me Lisa. You already have, Matthew." Lisa's heart was thudding in her chest. In the background on the other end, she could hear Rippner-- she had to assume it was Rippner-- making terrible sounds: choking, gasping. A rustling, as of a body writhing on a plastic sheet--

_So I have._ Leon chuckled. He left her hanging for five lengthy, silent seconds. _I've poisoned him, Lisa._

Lisa leaned against Rippner's desk. "Is there an antidote, Matthew?"

_"Matt." Please._

"Matt. Is there an antidote?"

_Don't you want to know why...?_

She could feel tears starting in her eyes. Frustration, an awful fear-- "I'm more interested in helping him."

_Ah. Honesty. Did he give you the speech, Lise?-- May I call you "Lise"--?-- You know: how he never lies, why he never lies, blah blah blah--?_

"There is an antidote, isn't there, Matt? Or we wouldn't be having this conversation. Right? You could simply sit and watch him die, and I would leave for my convention and never know what happened to him."

Leon's tone was genuinely admiring: _Smart girl._

"I have my moments." Her jaw was beginning to shake; she had to fight to sound calm. "What can I do to help him?"

_A little experiment. Two options._

"What are they?"

_There's a Fed Ex package outside Rippner's door. At least I hope there is. You know how it is: sometimes you pay for one-hour service and the bastards screw you over--_

"What's in the package, Matt?"

_Two things. One: the address at which you'll find a certain dumpster. Inside the dumpster is a plastic baggie containing a key. The key opens a train-terminal locker-- cheesy, yes, I know. Inside the locker is a duffel containing one hundred thousand dollars in unmarked bills. You'll have to hurry, though: the trash service that empties that dumpster will be by before noon, and it's-- let's see-- eleven twenty-four now. You take the key; you take the money; you forget you ever met Jackson Rippner. Sound good, Lise--? It sounds good to me._

"What else is in the package, Matt?"

_A small black box. There's a hypodermic inside it._

The shaking was beginning to spread through Lisa's torso, her arms and legs. She could no longer hear Rippner moving. A tear broke free and ran down her right cheek; she caught it savagely with the heel of her hand.

"What's in the hypo, Matt? Tell me, please."

_If you look even half as collected as you sound, Lisa, my God-- I'd hate to play poker with you._

"Is the antidote in the hypo?"

_Mmmm_-- She could imagine him lounging back in a chair, leaning casually into a doorframe, smiling (however he looked: all she could picture was an archetypical leer). At that moment, when he as much as purred into the phone, Lisa had never hated anyone so much in her life. That came as a shock: Rippner threatening her father that double handful of months back had nothing on this monster, right here, right now.

_A third of it is,_ Leon said, finally.

"Where are the other two thirds?"

_I have one right here._

"And the other one?"

_It's in you._

_Bastard--!_ Rippner's voice, a raw snarl. Lisa started in shock at the sound of it. Leon laughed--

_And there you thought you'd be stoic 'til the end. That's the first bet you lose today, Jack._

"What do I do?" Lisa asked.

_Wait, Lise-- Just a moment--_ From Leon's end, she could hear footsteps, crinkling. Then a muffled thud, a sharp gasp-- _There. Better, Jack--? Consider that one settled, shall we?_

"What do I do?" Lisa asked again. She left Rippner's study, crossed the apartment to the front door, the locking panel. No need to re-check the note he'd left; rattled or not, she had a head for numbers. She keyed the clearing code while she waited for Leon to stop kicking Rippner, beating him, whatever the hell he was doing.

The door opened. Just outside, on the black-and-white-tiled floor of the foyer, was a Fed Ex one-hour-service box. She looked around, then picked it up. It was very light. She was closing the door again when Leon said:

_You don't really want to do this._

"Maybe I won't," Lisa said casually. Her hand shaking, she took a paring knife from the block near the kitchen sink; she set the box on the counter, slit the sealing tape. "Tell me what it is."

_The antidote-- the third in the hypo-- needs to interact with human blood plasma. You inject yourself with the contents of the hypo; I give you my address; you come here. And by the time you arrive, your part of the antidote-- the part by then running through your veins-- will be ready to mix with the third of the antidote I have with me. It will take the contents of the hypo a minimum of fifteen minutes to react usefully with your blood. No less than that. Do you understand?_

Lisa opened the Fed Ex package. Inside were two things. The first was a slip of paper bearing a typed address. The second was a small hard-sided black box about the size and shape of an eyeglasses case. She opened it. Inside, strapped against gray felt, was a capped hypodermic.

"Yes, I understand." She glanced about for a pen, found one resting on a blank notepad near the refrigerator. "Give me your address, Matt."

_I have to warn you about the contents of that hypo, Lise--_

"Your address, please."

His tone was jokingly serious, a little sing-song, lyrical: _Side effects may include, but may not be limited to, extreme dizziness, drowsiness, and muscle cramps. It is not recommended that you drive or operate heavy machinery while under the influence of this or any other--_

"Matt--"

_You have thirty-seven minutes to get here._ The playfulness had left Leon's voice._ After that, poor Jackson will be too far gone. Nasty stuff, what he's been given. Here: I'm only going to say this once--_

-- and Lisa wrote out the address as he quoted it to her.

_Not that you'll use it,_ Leon added. _Take the money, Lisa; enjoy your life. Goodbye.  
_  
Just before the connection terminated, she heard Rippner again--

_Lisa, don't--_

-- and the line went dead.

*****

_Don't_ what--_?_

Lisa looked at her watch. Eleven thirty-three.

_Don't try to help me? Don't believe him?_

Three times she made and unmade a tight fist of her left hand. She tapped the inside of her left elbow as she'd seen the nurse in the bloodmobile do, to wake a vein.

_That's the first bet you lose today, Jack,_ Leon had said.

The first.

Was she the second...?

Did the hypo in fact contain her own share of the poison Leon had given Rippner?

"No." She said it firmly, out loud. Leon would want Rippner to know if she were dead; given the timetable Leon had set, Rippner would be unable to know: he'd be dead well before she was. Or before Leon would have a chance to verify her death.

Eleven thirty-four. Thirty-six minutes to go.

She had Leon's address. He wouldn't have lied about it: he didn't intend to mislead her by sending her off-course. No, he was running on ego: he wanted Rippner to know that she wouldn't come. The driving directions were simple enough, the distance reasonable. If she kept her head, she could be at Leon's place in less than twenty minutes. And then--

What was she doing? She had no guarantee, none whatsoever, that Leon would provide the third part of the antidote. He might have lied to her, if not to Rippner: Rippner might be dead before she got there. Or Leon might kill her in front of him. He might do other things to her first--

She shuddered.

_Lisa, don't--_

Lisa took a deep breath, slowly released it. Then she jetted the air from the hypo and injected the contents into her left arm.


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N:** Hate to say it-- especially to those of you threatening to send me tension-related doctor bills (_heh!_)-- but things are going to get worse for our intrepid duo before they get better. If "better" is still an option, that is....

*****

She left Rippner's apartment two minutes later. Two minutes after that she was on the road, behind the wheel of the silver 325i Rippner had driven them in from the airport the day before. The drizzle of yesterday had turned to sleet today; she felt a moment of panic at that, of driving a strange car in a strange city in _weather._ The roads were icing. But the BMW was a sure-footed little car, and traffic wasn't heavy. She had the lights with her, too.

Within twelve minutes, with the blessings of the traffic gods, she was at the address Leon had given her. A quiet side street three blocks off the main drag, no shops. A neighborhood of discreet galleries, underground clubs, old warehouses converted to studio apartments. A black latticework of fire escapes ascending brown brick walls. Outside the building Leon had named as his was parked a new black BMW 5 Series sedan. Lisa eased the 325i in behind it, shut off the motor, got out--

-- and nearly fell. A combination, all at once: a bloodrush of dizziness, wet ice beneath the nubbled soles of the sensible light boots she'd fortunately thought to bring along on her trip. She caught herself on the hood of the silver Beemer.

Took a deep breath. Time was passing. She felt trapped beneath the gray, sleeting sky. She could feel ice pellets catching in her hair, stinging her neck down the back of her collar.

She pulled herself straight, watched her step on the icing sidewalk, and entered Leon's building.

*****

The lobby. Burnished brass or copper fittings, walls faced in granite coffee-dark enough to swallow the light from the upturned sconces. No one was about. The elevator was thankfully modern, very fast. She was at Leon's door in under a minute.

*****

His was a friendly face. Dimples, an easy smile, dark, sparkling eyes. A thick tangle of curly dark hair on his head. He was taller than Rippner, likely over six feet shoeless, and unlike Rippner, who was all whipcord and proud lean muscle, he seemed the type who exercised only as much as he absolutely had to in order to avoid being an embarrassment to his employers or his vocation.

"I'm here for Jackson Rippner," Lisa said to him.

"You must be Lisa. How wonderful. We spoke on the phone; I'm Matt. How do you do?"

Leon offered his right hand. Lisa ignored it. "Where is he?" she asked coldly.

"Right there." Leon, stepping back to allow Lisa to enter, gestured behind himself, to the right. As she passed the doorframe, Lisa kept her distance while she followed his point.

Her heart lurched.

Leon's apartment, as Lisa had thought, was a loft converted from old warehouse or factory space. Gray light filtered in through high, sleet-splattered windows. Across the way, open stairs led to a dark second level. To Lisa's left was a kitchen area, a serving counter, four steel-framed, red-cushioned chairs around an old-fashioned steel-and-Formica dining table. On the serving counter was an open laptop, the screen dark and slumbering; on the table was a black sheath and a knife that might well have fit one of the empty slots in the case in Rippner's closet. Finally, slightly to Lisa's right, or to Leon's back-and-left, was an open living area, dark bookshelves, an entertainment center, a sofa and stuffed chairs in olive green, small square end tables. Rippner lay curled on his side where a coffee table might have gone, in the middle of a large sheet of heavy industrial-grade clear plastic. He was wearing one of his dark suits, sans tie. His face was corpse-pale and beaded with sweat; his shirt, as far as she could tell, was soaked with it. His eyes-- and this was the most awful thing-- his eyes, always so clear and lightning-blue, were open, and they were dull, unfocused.

He was maybe twelve feet away, and Lisa couldn't tell if he was alive or dead.

"Where is the antidote?" she asked Leon.

"My third of the antidote, you mean."

Something in his tone-- arrogance, confidence. Superiority. She recognized it--

_Customer service time._

She took another deep breath. She felt very, but not oddly, calm.

"Your third. Of course." She smiled slightly. Professionally. _Thank you for correcting me, Mr. Business Class._

Leon continued: "I understand you like movies--"

Lisa took the Walther from her coat pocket-- the Walther from the glove box of the 325i, the same Walther Rippner had offered her yesterday-- and pointed the silver snub barrel at his midriff.

"-- guns, too, I see," he finished, smoothly. "Before I take that away from you, let's play a game: Robert Ryan, Lou Gossett, Junior--"

The apartment contained one other thing. Near the foot of the stairs leading to the second level stood a very large, circular aquarium, lit from above. Between its stand and its own clear-glass height, it was nearly seven feet tall. It contained-- _what?_ Lisa frowned, trying to see; even as she attempted to force her eyes to focus-- _Were the contents of the hypo affecting her vision, or were the contents of the tank really so exotic at this distance?_-- she said:

"_The Deep_."

"Absolutely correct. With one minor modification." He looked affectionately toward the aquarium. "In _The Deep, _Mr. Ryan, Mr. Nick Nolte, and the lovely Miss Jacqueline Bisset-- did anyone ever tell you you look a bit like her, Lisa?-- had sharks and one very, very cranky moray eel with which to contend. Here we have jellyfish."

Lisa looked more closely, in the beginnings of horror, at the aquarium. Like any native Floridian, she respected jellyfish; like a good percentage of the beach-going population, she'd once been stung by a box jelly. What she saw in the tank were small, glowing balloons in translucent blue.

"Moon jellies," Leon said, following Lisa's line of vision. "Those aren't the ones you need to worry about. Though-- admittedly-- you're not in any shape to take a hit of neurotoxin at any level at this point. Trust me."

On cue, as if to prove the point, Lisa's vision blurred briefly and the floor seemed to shift beneath her feet. She fought to keep herself steady, and to do so surreptitiously: she felt as though she'd been standing with her knees locked, and the last thing she wanted-- it went without saying-- was to pass out now--

If Leon noticed her weakness, he didn't show it. He continued, his tone that of a polite host: "No, the ones that need concern you-- why, we can't even see them at this distance-- are only about an inch across. Irukandji. From Australia. Keeping them is highly illegal. They're extremely toxic, you see. Even to the healthiest of us."

With the Walther, Lisa gestured toward the aquarium. "The antidote: fish it out of--"

Like multiple lightning strikes, pain stabbed suddenly through her torso. Her shoulders, her chest, her stomach. She gasped--

-- and Leon reached with a cobra's whipsmooth speed and took the Walther from her hand. "Unless I miss my guess," he said, "that would be the cramps starting. I'm surprised you're still on your feet."

Lisa let him talk. She caught her breath. Tried to. The pain stuck and bounced and tore its way like electrified stickle-burrs throughout her body. She felt sweat popping out on her forehead.

_Focus, Reisert. Focus--_

She let her right hand drop to her side. She gently shook her arm--

"I may have to keep her, Jack," Leon was saying, over his shoulder, toward Rippner--

-- and a slender, rough-sided handle dropped from her coat sleeve into Lisa's hand. A hard edge, a tiny lever, against the ball of her thumb--

"She _is_ beautiful. Nearly magnificent, in fact--"

A swift, soft slither-and-click from the handle Lisa held between her fingers and palm.

Leon cast a grin, more a companionable leer, Rippner's way. "Too bad we won't have a chance to compare notes."

And Lisa rammed the blade of the S.O.G. lockback she'd taken from Rippner's knife-case-- her wrist straight, the handle gripped tight, the motion through her arm and chest that of a knockout punch-- into Leon's torso just south of his sternum.

He stood for a moment, stunned. He staggered back a step, as if he could thus escape the blade stuck in his diaphragm. But the S.O.G. went with him. He frowned down at the black-and-blue handle, wavering slightly on his feet.

Lisa held her breath--

Leon looked up again. Smiled. "Never mind."

He raised the barrel of the Walther until the muzzle was level with Lisa's forehead and pulled the trigger.

_Click_.

Lisa flinched. Leon frowned. Pulled the trigger again.

_Click_.

His smile returned with realization, even as the color drained from his face. "Like two peas in a pod, aren't you? Seems your girl hates guns as much as you do, Jack." He dropped the empty Walther; it landed with a _thunk_ on the hardwood floor. His eyes twinkled with dead light as his right hand went to the handle of the S.O.G.

Lisa, dizzy and weakening, stared in mounting horror--

Wincing, Leon drew out the blade. He pointed it Lisa's way.

"My turn," he said softly.


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N:** Hanky time. Sorry. Don't hurt me, okay? Errm, okay--?

*****

*****

Lisa watched the knife in Leon's hand. She tried to do as she'd been told in her self-defense classes: stay balanced, minimize yourself as a target, watch the sternum, not the eyes. Eyes can mislead. But she knew her body would betray her: right now, she hadn't the agility or the speed to keep out of the blade's way.

_I tried, Jackson._

Leon's eyes twinkled sympathetically. "Regrets, Lise--?"

And his hand and the S.O.G., the blade gory red, shot forward, right at her chest, and she wasn't fast enough, not nearly, as she tried to twist away--

He missed. The blade slit the lapel of her coat.

Leon shouted in pain.

Lisa froze at the raw animal shock in the sound. In the time it took her to draw another breath, what happened next was nearly halfway over.

When Lisa entered the apartment, she and Leon had closed some of the distance between themselves and Rippner. Leon had closed more of it when he took that staggering step back, the blade of the S.O.G. stuck in his torso.

Rippner had closed the rest now.

The sound that had just exploded from Leon's throat had come in response to Rippner slashing the Achilles tendon of his right foot. He had a knife, Rippner did (with numb, distant clarity, Lisa saw in her mind the two empty slots in his knife case, not one but _two_); now he had Leon as well. He was still on the floor, but he hauled Leon's weight backwards, savagely, onto that wounded right ankle, and Leon, shouting again in shock and pain, dropped to his knees even as he tried to defend himself, blocking with a back-swung arm.

Which was exactly what Rippner wanted. He jerked Leon's arm straight with his free hand, twisted it, shoved it upward and in, angling it across Leon's back. Leon lost the S.O.G.; he lost his balance to the twisting pain, went face-down on the floor.

She saw it, Lisa did. She saw what Rippner was about to do. She knew, in the second before it happened, two things:

_This is what he is._

And _I would be dead by now, if that was what he wanted._

Rippner rammed the blade of his knife, all the way to the guard, into the back of Leon's neck. Just below the base of his skull. A wet, hollow punching sound. Leon thrashed once and went still.

All in less than eight seconds.

Rippner sat twitching. He was gasping raggedly. He looked at the handle of his knife; he looked at Leon. He pushed off the floor as if fish hooks had been strung from the ceiling and barbed through his skin, as though his body were no longer his. He stood-- and then his legs buckled.

"Jackson--" Lisa caught him, grunted in her weakness as she took his weight. He looked at her as if confused. His face was grayish-white, slick with sweat. His body shook spastically against hers. She eased him to the sofa.

"Lie down," she said.

*****

She had to wonder how far the water would spread. She dragged one of the steel-frame kitchen chairs past Leon without looking at him. Nausea might come later; her mind had yet to register consciously the fact and violence of his death. Four feet from the aquarium, she stopped. The moon jellies drifted placidly in the clear dark water; the Irukandji remained invisible. Resting on the tank's blue-graveled bottom was a small black box much like the one she'd received at Rippner's.

Lisa grasped the top of the chair and swung the legs at the aquarium as hard as she could.

A _whump_ that sent electric jolts across her shoulders. A scrunching crack in the glass. A trickle of water.

She hoisted the chair, swung it again.

The middle of the aquarium disappeared. The water, exposed, hung for a moment, suspended. Then the top of the aquarium crashed into the bottom, and all was outrush and flood. Lisa dropped the chair, nearly slipped stepping clear. The jellyfish, borne in helpless slurpings across the smooth floor, came to rest in gelatinous puddles. The box remained where it was. Lisa reached for it--

Stopped.

On the top: an Irukandji. A perfect, tiny circle of clear gelatin.

She looked about: a tool, a spatula--

Leon. She crossed to him, minding her step on the wet floor. A jelly had washed up against his cheek. Red welts were rising on his freshly dead skin. Lisa looked away as she grasped the handle of Rippner's knife. The blade grated past vertebrae as it slid free.

She returned to the ruins of the aquarium, flicked the tiny jellyfish away with the blade of the knife. Looked closely, carefully, for others, saw none.

She crossed to the serving counter, the box in one hand, Rippner's knife in the other. She set both on the countertop, shrugged out of her coat. She opened the box. Fortunately water-tight. A hypo inside, the syringe half full of pale green liquid. She had to assume the empty half was meant for her blood.

She pushed up the sleeve of her cardigan, straightened her elbow, made a fist, tapped her skin.

And couldn't find a vein. The beginnings of panic as she remembered more from what she'd been told by a kindly Red Cross nurse trying to create a friendly distraction for a young woman obviously nervous around needles: Veins were smart. Sneaky. They dove deep and hid when they saw a needle coming. Who could blame them?

Lisa paused. Took a calming breath.

Her left hand. Veins branching on the back. Bluish tubes firm beneath the skin. She guided the needle with her free hand, held it in place with her fingertips, drew the plunger back with her lips. Her blood flowed, deep, rich red, up into the syringe.

Gently she shook the hypo. Careful small circles, to minimize the amount of air trapped in the liquid. The contents of the syringe turned a warm golden color.

She was turning from the counter toward the living area when another multi-jolt of pain hit her. A private earthquake, quick tiny tremblors of agony. She caved at the waist, gasping--

She dropped the hypo.

She watched it fall.

It didn't break. It tumbled sideways to the wet wooden floor. The plunger didn't depress; the needle didn't bend or snap.

Shaking, the pain again subsiding, she picked it up. Went to Rippner.

She knelt on the plastic sheeting beside the sofa. She held the hypo by the barrel of the syringe between her lips while she used Rippner's knife to slit to his elbow the sleeves of his suit jacket and dress shirt. His skin was clammy and cold. He was watching her, but she felt he couldn't quite see her.

"Two knives, Lise," he said. His voice was soft and desperate. "Always two knives. I always carry two; he didn't check for the second one. Promise me you'll check, Lise. Always check--"

"I promise, Jackson." She found a vein in his arm, or thought she did. Near enough. It had to be. She pushed the slant-razor-tip of the needle through his skin, pressed the plunger home. Rippner didn't flinch. She could see him watching with mild, distant curiosity as the antidote entered his body.

"If you don't check, you'll-- He didn't check. I worry about you, Lise. You must know I do. I worry about--"

He stopped speaking. He closed his eyes, breathed out. Went still. Lisa stared at his closed lids.

"Jackson--?"

She set the hypo aside, pressed shaking fingertips up under his jaw, felt his throat. The soft spots to the right and left of his Adam's apple, where she'd watched his pulse, counted the beats, only yesterday or the day before, on the plane, when he tried to tell her there was something besides darkness and rain, a fantastical, horrible _something_, outside the window. Very, very early this morning, then, too, as they looked at one another just after, immediately _after_, their bodies one in warmth, still quaking with shared pleasure. An impromptu, sleepy coupling. He'd smiled down at her, playfully rubbed noses with her, kissed her lips. Nothing but affection and respect in his clear eyes: she knew he knew, given the harm that had been done her in the past, how brave she'd been in allowing him to take his first turn on top. As he re-settled himself beside her, returned with her to sleep, she'd watched his throat and thought, wonderingly, how well they matched, the beat and pace of his heart and hers.

She'd outpaced him now. One time for all time. His pulse points felt still. His skin was cooling beneath her numb fingertips.  
_  
How many minutes too late?_ (In all the violence and excitement, she'd lost track of the count. She wasn't a doctor. She wasn't a secret agent. She was a desk manager at a bloody hotel.) In attacking Leon, had Rippner closed the distance between himself and death that much more quickly?

She sat herself near him on the plastic-sheeted floor. The plastic was dry. She rested her head near Rippner's, on the edge of the sofa cushion. Her eyes were filled with tears, but she was too tired to cry. Between the tension and horror of the last five minutes and whatever was in her blood, she was exhausted. She had to call the police--

No: she would do that from Rippner's apartment. Not from here.

_He won't mind._

Just a minute. One or two. To catch her breath, to clear her head, her blurring vision. Now that the fighting was done, the apartment was beginning to feel cooler. She shivered. She hadn't the focus to fetch her coat from the kitchen area. Across the way, Leon was lying silent and heavy. Our bodies are less gravity-defiant in death. His head was turned; he was facing away from her. His right hand was palm-up at his side in a sheen of water. She thought of Rippner behind her, the sweat evaporating from his shirt and forehead and pale cheeks, his forearm exposed where she'd slit his sleeves.

_He'll be cold--_

She thought she might sense him breathing. Stillness was sifting like dust from the darkness high up in the ceiling. The least breath would stir that dust, make an eddy, a current. From his lips to his lungs. He'd breathe in, out. She'd cover him with her coat, and he'd be warm--

Lisa rested her head against the sofa cushion and let the tears run down her cheeks.

*****

*****


	5. Chapter 5

The windows had gone a deep winter's-evening blue by the time Lisa realized a hand was clumsily stroking her hair. She raised her head, turned, her shoulders stiff and cold. Looked.

Rippner looked back at her. He frowned in muzzy concern.

"Not as bad as all that, is it?" he whispered hoarsely.

The apartment smelled of brine. Saltwater, cold sweat, and bile. The lamp near the sofa possessed wattage insufficient to displace the dusk that had invaded the living area in the handfuls of minutes, the leaden coalescence of hours, that Lisa had believed Rippner dead. The apartment's overheads seemed as distant as stars in another branch of the galaxy.

"Yes, it was," Lisa said, looking at Rippner there in the semi-dark. "It was as bad as all that."

The hand with which he'd stroked her hair came to rest against her cheek. "Very courageous of you to come here, Lisa. And very kind."

The tentative beginnings of tenderness in his expression and touch. Or simply lingering pain, numbness, and shock. She wasn't sure which it was for herself, let alone for him.

Lisa wiped her eyes.

"We need to get you to a hospital," she said.

"No," Rippner countered. The "please" remained unspoken. "Let's go home."

Cautiously, he sat up. She could see him shaking. She fetched her coat from the kitchen area, found his in a closet to the right of the apartment's door, where Leon, good, murderous host that he was, must have hung it.

"He called, said we were teamed on a job," Rippner said, watching her. "The company works that way sometime. Safer to have us share information face-to-face. More secure than telephone or e-mail."

Lisa came back to the sofa, the plastic on the floor crinkling under the soles of her boots. The same sound she'd heard over the phone, when Leon went to kick Rippner. He made no complaint as she helped him up, and that's how she knew how weak he was: he hadn't the strength to waste on sarcasm. Rippner shrugged slowly, painfully, into his coat. She wondered how badly, in addition to the poison, Leon had hurt him.

"Told me he had the job files loaded up, offline, on his laptop," Rippner said. "Took my coat while I went to have a look." He moved unsteadily, speaking, toward the kitchen area. Lisa went with him. She had no choice, really: he was supporting her as much as she was supporting him.

He went to the sink. He had in his free hand the knife that she had used to slit his sleeves.

_How--?_

Even in his weakness, he'd picked it up that smoothly, that invisibly. She hadn't seen him do it. Rippner turned on the tap at the kitchen sink and carefully washed the blood from the blade. He washed his hands, too. Red dish towels hanging on a steel bar to the side. Rippner took a towel, dried the blade of his knife, and reached across himself, under his suit jacket. A slender scabbard, in line with the jacket's side seam, zipped or velcroed into the suit's lining. The opening faced downward; Rippner carefully slid the blade up into it, secured the handle with a strap and snap. A weapon that a cursory side-pat under his jacket wouldn't reveal. While he washed, dried, concealed, he spoke softly:

"He offered me a cup of coffee. I said no, thanks. Professional mistrust. He was a chemistry freak, Lise. No secret there. I knew; he knew I knew. Wouldn't drink anything he gave me if I'd come straight out of the Kalahari. 'That's okay, Jack,' he said. By then I was waking up his laptop, cueing up the job files. Thought I was. There was nothing open on the screen. Right when I realized what he'd done, he said it for me: 'The poison is on the keyboard.'"

He stopped speaking, went quiet. Lisa could see more plainly now, now that they were standing in more light: the sweat on his chest was mingled with vomit. His chin was spattered with it, too. She shuddered, feeling sick and clammy herself. She looked over at Leon's body, and a wave of primal revulsion washed through her.

"Are you okay?" Rippner asked.

"Not really," Lisa replied.

"Wait." He left her, went unsteadily to the apartment's resident corpse. He bent at the waist with all the uncertainty-- understandable-- of a man who'd been poisoned, kicked, and left for dead and took a cell phone from Leon's pocket. He hit a number on speed dial, paused, and said into the transmitter: "This is Rippner. Leon is dead. Carter, tell the rest of the junior varsity: if they want the position, they go through HR, or I will kill every one of them. Clear?"

He didn't wait for a reply. Likely talking to an answering machine. He shut the phone again and dropped it on Leon's back. He picked up and pocketed the empty Walther. Then he took his other knife and scabbard from the kitchen table.

"Okay. Let's go."

*****

Possibly the first and only joke of the day: the certainty with which he said "Let's go."

Not so bad, leaving the building, save for when the elevator doors closed on the back of Rippner's coat and nearly jerked him-- and Lisa-- over backwards. Still no one around to see.

No: the fun began when they stepped outside.

Maybe twenty feet separated them from the silver Beemer, the 325i. That was all. Twenty feet of gray, cityworn sidewalk.

And blasting wind. And ice.

Being from a less seasonally tormented region of the United States, that is to say a region whose seasons featured temperatures that rarely, if ever, dipped below thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit, Lisa had had, she would admit, but limited contact with ice and snow, and then only in the context of ski vacations. Snow and ice were exotic to her, things to encounter voluntarily, a treat.

In short, freezing rain-- not to mention a meteorogical mess like the remainder of the shit-storm waiting for them beyond the outer doors of Leon's building, comprised of snow and sleet driven almost horizontally into her face and Rippner's by a steady northwest wind-- was entirely outside her realm of experience.

And here she was, tired and sick and the next best-- or worst-- thing to stoned, with an only recently resurrected Rippner leaning on her for support.

Step.

Slip.

She nearly went down. He did, too. Water on ice on the sidewalk. They spun to face each other--

Caught each other by the upper arms like a pair of skydivers. Miraculously, the sidewalk stayed where it belonged, beneath their feet.

Between the two of them, they seemed to have approximately two and a half usable legs. They propped one another to the 325i like a pair of drunks. The sleet as much as sandblasted away the remainder of Lisa's strength; thankfully, the windows and doors of Rippner's "baby Beemer" were still warm enough to be mostly clear of solid ice. His Five-Series looked like a small black glacier. Lisa got Rippner buckled into the passenger seat of the 325i, secured herself in the driver's seat, and started the engine.

The streets were terrible. Largely empty, the locals obviously having hearkened to the advice of the weather gods and forgone their travel plans for the evening, but awful. Even with the sedan's sure footing, the stability control and good tires. While Lisa vise-gripped the steering wheel and peered through the ice battling the car's defroster for control of the windshield, Rippner relaxed back in the passenger seat. He yawned. He was half-facing her with his eyes closed, his head scrunched comfortably between his shoulder and his seat's headrest.

"Good thing I'm driving," he mumbled absently. "You wouldn't have a chance on these roads, Lise."

_Great_.

Just as the corollary struck her, there in her weather-jittered, semi-drugged exhaustion-- _**Am** I really driving--?_-- a light immediately ahead went from yellow to red, and she hit the brakes.

And slid halfway into an intersection.

With a police car approaching to her right.

They missed one another, graciously, the BMW and the Crown Victoria. No point in stopping, even less in backing up. Lisa ran the red, and the lightbar on top of the big black-and-white Ford now behind them flashed out an invitation. She pulled over to the snowy, sleety, icy curb and brought the 325i to a halt.

Rippner raised his head, opened his eyes, looked about with a muzzy frown--

_We're being stopped by the police._

He shifted in his seat, straightened. Lisa saw him tense slightly as he spotted the lights flashing behind them.

_We're being stopped by the police. We're both wasted. He's armed--_

A man's form, dark and jacketed, trudging up on the Beemer's driver's side. Beside her, Rippner was watchful. He had his hands in his lap.

_We killed a man today. He tried to kill us, and we--_

A muffled tap to the left of her head. Lisa put on her customer-service face. Calm, open. She reached for the control on the armrest and looked up as the window opened. She smiled sheepishly as the wind gifted her with a peppering of sleet. "I'm really sorry about that."

The officer was about forty-five, weathered, blue-eyed. He looked with amiable caution from Lisa to Rippner, back again.

"Got away from you a bit back there?" he asked Lisa.

"Yes, sir. I'm not used to driving in weather like this."

"Let me see your license, please, miss."

She'd thought-- thank God, she'd thought-- to bring her purse. She handed the officer her license. He shone a penlight on it.

"Florida." He smiled, professionally, as he handed the license back. "This must seem like a nightmare."

"Yes, sir."

He hadn't asked for registration. Likely he'd already run the plate, had seen that the car wasn't reported stolen.

"What are you doing out on a night like this?"

A question at the very edge of search-and-seizure. Nothing between her seat and Rippner's, nothing immediately apparent in the back seat, either. No visible drugs or weapons. No incriminating odors, either, as far as she could tell. Lisa hesitated.

"Oysters," Rippner said.

"What's that, sir?" the officer asked.

"Oysters." Rippner looked over, smiled up at him wanly, a little drunkenly. "At the Drake. I hit a bad batch. We thought it best that Lisa drive us home."

Traces of vomit on his chin, a touch of glassiness to the ice-blue eyes. The officer asked Rippner: "Have you been drinking, sir?"

"Enough to wash down the oysters. Lisa stuck to Cobb salad and Perrier. Smart girl. Right now, I have to admit, sir, I envy the hell out of her."

"I can imagine." The officer's smile became just a trace more sympathetic. He looked again at Lisa. "You want to take it easy on these roads, miss."

"Yes, sir. I will. Thank you."

He returned to the Crown Victoria. She let him pull off in front of them. She didn't say anything. Neither did Rippner.

Before Lisa put the BMW back in drive, he reached over and squeezed her hand.

*****

In the parking garage of Rippner's building, they kept their arms around each other's waists as they staggered to the elevator. More as veterans of a shared war, comrades, far less as lovers or friends. Inside his apartment, she got him to his bedroom. He refused to rest without cleaning himself; she could tell he was ashamed of his weakness, the shaking in his limbs, the vomit, the sweat-salt coating his skin; she didn't tell him he was being silly. Rippner shrugged out of his suit jacket, let it fall to the floor. He stood before the bathroom mirror and picked with shaking fingers at the buttons of his dress shirt. Concentration on his handsome, pale face, his brushy eyebrows lowering in mounting frustration. Lisa stilled his hands, unbuttoned his shirt for him. She felt his eyes in their unreal blue quietly watching her as she worked, her hands just that much more steady than his. There was a greenish-black bruise the size of her paired hands forming high on his right side. His breath whistled sharply past his lips when she brushed it in passing, pushing his shirt from his shoulders. While he stepped into the shower, she went to find him a fresh pair of boxer-briefs and a clean white t-shirt. He wasn't ashamed of his nudity, and she wasn't embarrassed by it.

While he showered, she cleaned herself at the sink. Washed her face and hands, ran a wet, warm washcloth up her arms, across the back of her neck.

_Help yourself to anything._

It was as though she'd read the words a year ago. The note was still on the nightstand, where she'd left it. While Rippner showered, Lisa in his dresser found for herself a pair of gray sweatpants, a midnight-blue sweatshirt, a heavy pair of tube socks. The room blurred briefly as her head emerged from the neck hole in the shirt. She braced herself for the cramping she thought would follow; instead, a slow wave of dizziness broke over her. She stumbled against the foot of the bed, sat down. Felt her weakness in the trembling across her chest and shoulders. So much for going anywhere else tonight, even barring the weather, even discounting the fact that she'd just dressed herself for a night in: transferring to the convention hotel would have to wait. As for the convention itself--

She shook herself awake. She'd nearly fallen asleep right there, sitting--

_Nearly?_

She looked, panicked, at the bedside clock.

Ten minutes had passed.

The shower was still running. Lisa went to the bathroom. Through the frosted glass of the stall door, she could see Rippner. He was on his feet, not moving.

She gently rapped the glass. "Jackson?"

No response.

"Jackson--?"

Nothing.

Lisa slid the door open, got herself a faceful of soap-scented steam. Rippner was leaning against the wall of the shower stall, the water beating down on his chest and flat belly. His eyes were closed. He was snoring softly.

Asleep on his feet.

Lisa reached to the side, shut off the water. Rippner's hand shot out and caught her wrist. Hard.

He had large hands for his size. Strong, capable fingers. They locked on her like titanium now. She felt her flesh bruising against the bones of her wrist.

"Jackson," she said, again, very calmly. Her hand was still on the tap handle. She turned her head slowly to look at him.

At first his eyes were as distant and cold as lunar ice. Then he frowned and said, a little sheepishly: "I fell asleep."

"Yes, you did."

"I'm sorry." He released Lisa's wrist. She straightened, took a towel from the rack, held it out for him.

"It's okay--"

He fell into her, into her and the open towel. Lisa caught him, got her terry-wrapped arms around him. Rippner clung to her, panting. His naked body was hard and shower-warm and wet against her, slick and unsteady in her arms. He chanted in breathless frustration against her neck--

"Shit, shit, shit, shit--"

Lisa held him tighter. Patiently. Though if she had another dizzy spell herself, right now, they'd be in a pretty mess. What a pair. She kept her eyes on his shoulder while she waited for Rippner to stabilize. Counted the pale freckles on his paler skin. His wet hair was dripping on her neck.

At last, he took a deep breath, gently disengaged himself. Quietly dressed himself before her weak, watchful eyes. Carefully rinsed his mouth, brushed his teeth. He staggered as they left the bathroom. Lisa slid her arm again around his lean waist. "Here, baby." The first time she'd called him by a pet name. Neither of them noticed right then. She guided him to the bed, and Rippner as much as fell facedown onto it. He was asleep before Lisa finished covering him.

*****

Stillness in the apartment. She felt disconnected. She went to the living area, opened her suitcase, found her phone. Thirty-three messages. She felt as though she were standing behind herself looking over her shoulder at the glowing screen. She tallied the calls, determined a winner and a runner-up. The others could wait. She called her dad first.

*****

"Lisa, where have you been? I've been worried."

A typical Joe Reisert opening. That, for the first time in ages, his worry had been right on target was something he needn't know.

"I'm right here, Dad. I'm okay. I met an old friend on the plane; we picked up a touch of flu, that's all."

"I e-mailed you those coupons for Airborne. Didn't you use them?"

Lisa stretched out on Rippner's L-sofa. "Sorry, Dad."

"That's winter up north, Lisa. Your friend: she's sick, too?"

"He." Lisa corrected him automatically. A second later, she smacked herself on the forehead--

"He?" demanded Joe. "Who-he?"

"An old friend, Dad."

"You're not at your hotel."

She knew where this was going. She felt not unlike Buster Keaton clinging to the cow-catcher at the front of a speeding train. "No--"

"You're staying at _his_ place, Lisa? Do I know this guy?"

"Not really-- He has a really nice sofa." That much, at least, was truthful enough.

"Who's sleeping on it? You or him?"

"Neither of us, Dad. I was going to make us some supper."

"He can't make his own supper?"

"He's lying down. In his room. I told you, Dad: he's not feeling well. Neither am I."

Joe Reisert paused. When he spoke again, his voice was gentler: "Is he a nice guy, Lisa?"

"Yes, Dad."

"You're sure?"

"He's sweet." _At least when he's unarmed or unconscious and he doesn't consider you a threat._

"Will I be meeting him?"

She smiled. "Getting ahead of yourself, Dad."

"Gotta think of all those grandkids I'm not seeing--"

Now she laughed. The first time in days. The sound took her by surprise. "Oh, come on--!"

"I tell you, Lisa, nice guys don't happen by every day--"

"I'm hanging up now, Dad."

"You find yourself a good one, you've got to-- Wait: he's not gay, is he?"

Lisa chuckled. "Saying goodbye--"

"Lisa." The joking left Joe's voice. The affection didn't. "Take care of yourself. Feel better. Call again soon, okay?"

"I will."

"I love you, sweetie."

"Love you, too, Dad. Bye."

*****

Call number two: Eric.

Mighty Eric. Eric the Viking. Eric Janssen, bullet-headed, burly, career-driven. Forty-four years old, a real company man. He and Lisa were the Lux Atlantic's co-representatives at the convention.

"Reisert, where the hell have you been?"

Obviously the burdens of solo diplomacy were weighing heavily on Mr. Janssen. "Got taken ill, Eric," she told him.

"You never checked in."

_That's very observant of you, Eric._ "No, Eric, I didn't." She felt it as she spoke: a cluster of cramps gathering in her shoulders, chest, belly. "I'm sorry; I--"

"Are you here, Reisert--? In town?"

Lisa braced herself. "Yes--"

"You missed some great seminars today--"

She let him talk about reservation software, thread-count theories, the latest in convenience services and in-room coffee-brewing technology. All this while shells burst in her muscles and pain lit the backs of her retinas like flares in a night sky.

Still, she told herself, it wasn't as bad, not nearly as bad, as the first wave of cramps in Leon's apartment. The pain subsided just as Janssen was saying--

"If I didn't know you better, Reisert, I'd say you were shacked up with some guy."

He wasn't joking. Or he was, and it was ugly, not friendly. Months back, he'd asked her out, and she'd turned him down, and now his hurt ego was free to make assumptions about her sexuality. Never anything overt. No obscenities, no verbal slurs.

_Have you ever stabbed someone, Eric?_

"Maybe I am," she heard herself say. She could play her customer-service face-- or voice-- with him, and he was never the wiser.

"Somehow I doubt it."

_I have. This afternoon. Then I watched someone kill him._

"I'll try to make it tomorrow--"

"You'd better. There's gonna be hell to pay."

_And I was glad to see him die. I'm still glad now. You see, Eric, it's not about me. It's not about emotion-based female dilemmas. It's about male, testosterone-based cruelty._

"They can always dock my next paycheck. It's not as if I haven't always been there for them. They owe me an absence or two."

At that, Eric paused. She could sense him sniffing his way around her words, the tone in her voice. She was never weak with him, but she was never this direct, either.

"Were the Keurig representatives there, Eric?"

Triviality. She threw it to him like a life ring.

"What-- Yeah: they say the new B-17 in-rooms will be ready to go by second quarter."

"That's great, Eric."

"Yeah, it is. Make a hell of a cup of coffee, those things--"

"Goodbye, Eric."

"Wait a minute-- Reisert--"

She hung up. She switched off her phone and lay on her back on Rippner's sofa while the cramping subsided and weariness took its place. She felt curiously free.

*****

In the freezer above the refrigerator, she found bag-packed meals. One plastic sack identified itself as butternut-squash soup. She warmed it, per directions, in the microwave, and ate it feeling less hungry than she knew she actually was. Something simply to settle her stomach, to take the edge off her unsteadiness.

She went back upstairs. She brushed her teeth, then stretched out beside Rippner on the bed. Rippner's eyes remained closed, his breathing deep and slow. She took her share of the sheet and blankets, nestled herself, then lay watching him.

"You could have left me." The words were a soft, subterranean rumble. He opened his eyes, looked at her sleepily. "You didn't. Thank you."

"You're welcome."

Rippner smiled; he raised up a bit, eased closer. He kissed her gently. Lisa trembled. Belly and loins, a whisper of wanting. When their lips parted, she smiled back at him-- and then she kissed him just as gently in return.

It was a revelation, that leisurely kiss. Touching him not out of reckless-- or misguided-- lust or curiosity, but because she wanted to, because it pleased her to do so: this was something new.

It seemed to be a revelation for Rippner, too, even if revelations might at the moment lie outside his zone of appreciation. He lay for a long moment afterward, once Lisa had re-parked her head on her pillow, simply looking at her. She wouldn't presume to be able to read him with absolute precision, but at a guess she would say he was having trouble staying awake. His eyelids drooped, the ridiculously long lashes nearly meshed, top and bottom, and his eyes, thus slitted, were glowing forth their extraordinary color, the high clear blue you might see if you were looking up at the sky from the bottom of a mountain crevasse. Which image sent shivers through Lisa, though she was anything but cold.

"Get some sleep," Rippner said softly.

"You, too." She reached across and brushed hair away from his eyes. His hair was thick, and he'd fallen asleep with it wet; he'd have a magnificent case of bed-head in the morning. "Do you want anything? Water? Maybe some soup? Toast--?"

"No. Not right now. Thank you."

The "thank you" all but slurred from him. Rippner let his eyes close. Almost immediately, his breathing deepened and slowed, and Lisa knew he was asleep again. She snuggled closer to him and closed her eyes.

*****

She woke. According to the clock, an hour had passed. The lamp on her side of the bed was still on. Rippner was still facing her, lying peacefully, his eyes closed. A soft murmuring was coming from deep in his throat. She eased herself away from him, got up, padded downstairs. Thirsty for something other than a glass of water from the bathroom tap. She stood in the kitchen, the only illumination the pale light from the refrigerator, and felt sneaky as she drank orange juice from the bottle she and Rippner had bought yesterday at Babbitt's Deli.

Behind her, the door handle turned. She froze. Her heart jolted like a brick in her chest. She heard a click, a key slotting into a lock. A deadbolt-slither. She set the bottle back in the refrigerator and closed the door. Then all she could think to do was to step to the right of the apartment door. Soundlessly, in sock-feet.

The door opened. Lisa pressed herself to the wall behind it.

A man entered. Very tall, dark-haired, ostensibly well built. He brought with him, in passing, cold from outside. Dampness lingered on his dark jacket; icy droplets pattered softly to the kitchen floor. He was carrying two large paper bags, one in each hand. He set down one bag in order to pocket a set of keys; as the door closed behind him and Lisa pressed herself that much more tightly to the wall, he hoisted the bags by their handles onto the kitchen table.

Then he reached to his waist, under his jacket, and unholstered a gun.

He looked through the kitchen to the stairs leading to the apartment's second level and Rippner's bedroom. He walked cautiously through the dark living area, toward the the slant triangle of light coming from the open bedroom door.

_Not again._

Lisa was stock-still.

_He can't be alive. He can't._

Moving away from the wall was an act of will. Fear and shock pressed her back with all the gravitational force of a space launch. It was as though she could feel her lungs collapsing.

She was still looking after the stranger as she reached for the knife block. She kept her eyes on his back as he started up the stairs, as her fingers closed on a hard, round handle and she drew forth a knife.

Silently she followed him.

*****


	6. Chapter 6

At the top of the stairs, the stranger paused. With his free hand, he opened the bedroom door a bit more widely, looked in. He released more light onto the landing, doing so. From the pool of dimness at the bottom of the stairs, Lisa (who by now, in her fear and tension, had the eyes of a lemur) could see quite plainly: he wasn't Leon. He turned his head in hawkish profile as he looked into Rippner's room.

Then he turned and looked down the stairs.

Right at Lisa.

"You've grabbed the knife sharpener, Miss Reisert," he said, very softly.

Lisa looked where he was looking: at her right hand. A round, hard handle as she'd reached for the knife block. Not the half-flat grips of the boning knife, the paring knife, even one of the steak knives. She looked in hopeless realization at the slender, blunt-tipped wand of metal in her hand.

The stranger chuckled, started down the stairs. He straightened his gun arm to his side. Lisa numbly held her ground.

"Why don't we go to the kitchen, and you can pick yourself a proper weapon?" His voice was absolutely polite. Not a hint of sarcasm.

He brushed past her and went back through the living area. Lisa started when the kitchen light came on. She stared at the knife sharpener in her shaking hand. She looked up the stairs to Rippner's bedroom door.

Then she turned and went toward the kitchen light.

*****

He was hanging his jacket on the back of one of the kitchen chairs when she came to a stop just outside the doorway. He looked over. He was, as Lisa had already noted, very tall. A young late-fortyish, dark hair swept back off a high forehead, leanly handsome. His eyes on her were very dark, very intent. He was wearing jeans and a charcoal-gray sweatshirt. A red-and-white logo crossed his broad chest. _Blackhawks Hockey._

"I've put my gun away," he said. He smiled slightly, a little apologetically. As if he were uncomfortable making a joke at her expense. "Is that alright with you, Miss Reisert?"

Lisa nodded.

"As for a proper knife for you--" He reached into his jeans pocket and set something on the kitchen table. "Will this do?"

It was the S.O.G. The black-and-blue-handled lockback she'd taken to Leon's. As Lisa stared at it, he continued:

"The locking code on Rippner's front door wasn't set. I thought something else might be wrong. Been a long day, hasn't it?"

He had a very gentle voice. Lisa felt tears start in her eyes. "Yes."

"I'm John Carter, Miss Reisert. Jackson's minder. May I speak to you?"

She nodded.

"Cup of tea?"

"Sure."

He took a stainless-steel teakettle from the back burner of the stove, filled it at the sink tap. While the water heated and he searched Rippner's cupboards for tea, Carter continued:

"There's a rumor among the younger agents-- a sort of corporate urban legend-- that if someone is switching jobs and you kill him without going through the channels-- on your own initiative-- you step into his spot with all his perqs and a bonus to boot. Ah--" He smiled as he found the tea. He took two bags from the cellophane packet, set them on the counter, and went in search of mugs. "Completely false, but you know how it is: once scuttlebutt starts, it's impossible to stop."

Lisa watched him set two mugs on the counter. Her voice made hardly any sound: "Is Jackson quitting, Mr. Carter?"

"Transferring. Which I think is a good thing; he's--" He stopped; he looked at her, frowning. "Are you afraid of me, Miss Reisert?"

"Yes," Lisa replied honestly.

"Why?"

His expression and tone were absolutely guileless. Lisa looked back at him evenly. "Because I helped Jackson kill Leon."

"You mean, I should now torture and-or kill you because you killed one of my men."

She nodded.

"Would that bring him back? No. Would it make him a better agent if he _were_ plucked-- undeservedly-- from the grave? Hardly." He turned his attention to the paper sacks on the kitchen table. "In effect, by harming you, I would be rewarding Mr. Leon's incompetence." He took from one of the bags a frozen pizza and turned to the refrigerator. With his other hand on the handle to the freezer door, he turned to Lisa and asked: "Why should I want to do that?"

"Groceries," she replied, realizing--

Carter looked momentarily perplexed. Then he smiled, stowed the pizza among the bag-meals in Rippner's freezer, continued unpacking. "Odds and ends. Thought I'd stop on the way. The wife wanted me to pick a few things up anyway. Rippner never has enough food-- make that junk food-- on hand. The problem with playing favorites. I worry about him--"

"You're married?"

"Eighteen years. Three daughters. Our oldest just turned fifteen." He smiled with all the weary pleasure of a seasoned proud father. His eyes when he looked at her again were warm and brown. "You mean your boss doesn't bring you groceries when you're sick and there's a travel advisory?"

Lisa shook her head numbly. Behind her, the teakettle keened a breathy whistle.

"Maybe you should come to work for me," Carter said.

*****

The grocery bags were folded and pushed neatly between the waste bin and the kitchen wall. They had yielded, in addition to the pizza, frozen egg rolls, frozen waffles, orange juice, milk, four bananas, four apples, four cans of soup, carrots, celery, microwave popcorn, peanut butter, saltines, a box of plain strawberry Pop Tarts, and a brick of Neapolitan ice cream. Lisa, despite herself, nearly laughed at the seeming transdimensionality of it, the space-efficient precision with which Carter had packed the bags.

Now she sat across from him at the kitchen table, a steaming mug set before her, watching him stir milk into his tea.

"Not quitting. Transferring. Security systems, programming and design." Carter took a cautious, appreciative sip of his tea. "It's my job now to facilitate things for him."

"Why is he transferring, Mr. Carter?"

"Do you think it's because of you--?"

Lisa felt her cheeks warm. She looked at her tea.

"A transformation at soul level? A change of heart? The love of a good woman--?"

"I don't love him," she said.

"Of course not. Forgive me: I was teasing you." He waited until she looked back at him. His expression was sincere. "Miss Reisert, do you know the average life expectancy of a man in Jackson's position?"

She took a sip of tea, shook her head.

"They count their time in months, not years. Jackson is well past due." He drank more of his tea, then shifted in his chair, a look of minor discomfort on his face. He reached to his side; Lisa watched him adjust the position of the holster at his belt. "I must apologize for the gun. Young men who've been trained as Jackson has don't always respond well to kindness."

"Are you saying he might hate me for helping him?"

"A form of projection. He might blame you for his weakness. Resentment leading to violence, maybe even your death. Miss Reisert, I've seen it."

A shudder tapped its way between Lisa's shoulder blades. "He's been very civil toward me."

"Pardon me for asking, but what do you know about human nature?"

"I have two thirds of a degree in psychology."

"You do--?" The brown eyes blinked.

Lisa smiled slightly as she reached again for her mug. "Not what it says in my dossier, Mr. Carter?"

He looked amiably caught out. "Your dossier says 'business,' Miss Reisert."

"I minored in psych. I work long hours in customer service. I can read people."

"Even the people you sleep with?"

"Even them." She looked at him. "Where do I fit in here, Mr. Carter?"

"Jackson is a very bright boy. We have to make sure that he can still function as a human being. He's chosen you as his sponsor, if you will. A source of healthy human interaction."

"Sex, you mean."

"If he wanted only sex, he would have gone through one of our screened escort services." Carter spoke frankly. "He's obviously comfortable around you; he appreciates your company."

"What if I refuse?"

"Refuse me or refuse him?"

"Either of you. Any of this. What if I said, 'Thank you for the one-night stand and the near-death experience, Jackson. It was fun, but I've got to go.'?"

"Go, then, Miss Reisert." Carter nodded over his shoulder, toward the door. "You are absolutely free to leave at any time. Though I will say it's a terrible night. You'd be much better off waiting until they've sanded the streets."

"And if I stay--?"

"We give you a killswitch."

Lisa was suddenly cold. "What is that?"

"If at any time he threatens you, harms you-- if ever you feel he's endangering you-- you call me."

It was as if the sleet outside were sifting through the walls of Rippner's building and filling her veins.

"And you kill him," she said.

Carter nodded. His dark eyes were troubled. "You have to understand, Miss Reisert: it's like rehabilitating a pit bull that's been used for fighting. Sometimes the animal is too far gone."

"He's not an animal."

"Then he has hope."

"What if I refuse the killswitch?"

Carter hesitated. Finally, very softly, he said: "Please don't make me do that."

"You'd kill him now."

Another terrible pause. "Yes."

"Oh, my God."

He kept his hands on the table, kept his eyes between them. His hands were large and strong-looking. Lisa could see the fine balance of him beneath the Blackhawks sweatshirt. Muscle and lethality.

"Who are you?" she asked quietly. "_What_ are you?"

"A multi-national coalition of government operatives. I'm sorry, but we--" -- and here his expression relaxed slightly-- "-- we don't have a clever acronym. Nothing like S.M.E.R.S.H. or C.H.A.O.S. Not even U.N.C.L.E." He looked at her again, the trace of a smile on his lips. "We are not anarchists, Miss Reisert. We are not terrorists. We're facilitators, if you will. Social editors, not social engineers. A step outside the regular channels of government, regulation, and the law."

"You break the law as you see fit--?"

"We bend it, here and there. Turns out it's a very elastic thing. Our managers are trained to use the resources at hand-- personnel, materiel-- to accomplish the editing tasks we set for them. The best of them-- like Jackson-- know enough to make their targets use their strengths against themselves. A sort of mental judo. You're a caring person, Lisa. You have your whole life against you on that count. He knows that; so do you."

"I can't go against my nature, you're saying."

"Something like that."

"Can he?"

"Being a spook and a killer is a product of training, not of nature. He's not a psychopath. We try to avoid those, you see: they're too unpredictable in the field. A danger to themselves and others. Nature can't be changed, Miss Reisert. Training can."

A trace of a dry smile. "Through 'quality human interaction.'"

"That's a key component of it." He sounded honestly hopeful. "So are deprogramming and analysis."

"Is he worth saving?"

"Yes."

Somehow she wasn't surprised when he put one of his hands over hers there on the table, squeezed gently. Carter rose. "I should be going; you must be exhausted." He set his mug on the sideboard, near the sink. He put on his jacket. From an inner pocket he took a pen and a small notebook. He wrote something, tore out the page, placed it on the table near Lisa's mug.

On the paper were a phone number and a single word:

_Bagels_.

Lisa looked at it. "Will he be alright, Mr. Carter?"

Carter paused. He chose to answer for the here-and-now.

"He'd be dead or comatose by now if he weren't. I'd say he's at the sleep-it-off stage."

Lisa nodded. She rose, automatically the hostess, and moved with him to the apartment door.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he's out all night," Carter continued. "Get some liquids into him when you can. B-vitamins, too, if he has any around. He'll be ravenous in the morning. Emergency medical contacts-- I doubt you'll need them, but just in case-- should be on his landline." He offered Lisa his hand. "Good night, Miss Reisert."

She took his hand. His grip was warm, oddly reassuring.

"Good night, Mr. Carter."

"Home to my Dejah Thoris. Set the locking code this time, Miss Reisert, would you?"

He left. Lisa closed and locked the door behind him.

_Dejah Thoris._

She rinsed her mug, set it in the sink.

_Carter. John Carter._

Turning out the kitchen light. Passing through the dark living area as knowingly as a woman at home. Toward Rippner's bedroom, the expressionist triangle of light on the stairs.

_John Carter, Warlord of Mars._

Lisa smiled.

*****

Carter had been right: she was exhausted. But she couldn't sleep. Not just yet. She sat beside Rippner on his bed, and she could tell by his breathing: he was awake.

"Who was he, Jackson?"

"Leon?"

She didn't hesitate. "Yes."

"We trained together; years back, I got a promotion he thought he deserved; he was jockeying for my job."

"You're quitting?"

"Transferring. I thought Carter told you."

Now she paused. Only for a moment. "How much did you hear?"

Rippner opened his eyes, looked at her. Some of the color had come back to his face. He smiled slightly. No coldness, though, in the set of his mouth. None at all. He sat forward, next to her, and gently shifted her hair away from the right side of her neck. In the moment before his lips touched her skin, a tremble passed through her. _He could kill me right now. He could strangle me, break my neck._

She smiled as Rippner kissed her throat. A curious, wonderful sense of freedom. No fear.

"I still owe you for those bagels," he murmured.

"The note you left said something about dinner."

"Anywhere."

"One Aldwych. Indigo."

"That's in London."

"Mm hm."

"Talking a bit of vacation, are we?"

"My company owes me about three years' worth. How about yours...?"

"We'll have to fly. Once the weather clears. Eight hours on a plane, Lise. Think you're up to it?"

"You'll find a way to keep me distracted, Jackson." Lisa turned to him, traced Rippner's full lower lip. One light fingertip on his skin. He shivered almost imperceptibly. Smiled, the slightest trace of a knowing smirk. Lisa didn't mind. She smiled for him in return, just before she shut his smirk down with a kiss. "You always do."

**THE END**

**

* * *

  
**

**A/N: **Well, that's it. Thanks again for reading; thanks, too, for the kind comments. Let me know if you think Jackson and Lisa's adventure in London is worth the telling. In the meantime, take care-- and I'm sorry that Tom Cruise couldn't stop by to stomp those jellyfish and call 'em glib. (If that's not an obscure way to end this thing, I don't know what is. Heh. Good night, all. 'Til next time.)**  
**


End file.
